"It was a wonderful experience interacting with you and appreciate the way you have planned and executed the whole publication process within the agreed timelines.”
Subrat SaurabhAuthor of Kuch Woh Pal
The College Street Coffee House is still a much-revered institution in Kolkata. Its mystique lingers, despite its dilapidated appearance that evokes another era. Intellectuals from a range of disciplines met to discuss compelling ideas in a free-flowing style – the quintessential Bengali adda, punctuated with many cups of coffee. Twenty-six intellectual, political, and cultural icons including Rabin Mandal, Soumitra Chatterjee, Usha Ganguly, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Sabyasachi Bhattacharya, and Ashim Chatterjee share their memories of Coffee House. Their portrait photos and absorbing reminiscences capture the tumultuous and changing intellectual, political, and cultural currents that surged through Bengal from the 1950s to the 1990s.
“Such a pleasure to have this account of a great unofficial institution from a disarming multiplicity of perspectives - photographic, personal, and intellectual - and to listen in on its hubbub.”Amit Chaudhuri
Mala Mukerjee, Jael Silliman
Mala Mukerjee graduated in Applied Art & Design Studies in Photography from the London Guildhall University. Her work has been exhibited widely and has earned awards in the UK, China and in India. She is an Honorary Fellow of the Bangladesh Photographic Society. In 2002, Blink, a Phaidon Press publication, London, featured her among 100 photographers of the world. She has co-authored two books, Colonial Calcutta and Where Gods Reside: Sacred Places of Kolkata
www.malaphotogallery.com
Jael Silliman was a tenured Associate Professor of Women’s Studies at the University of Iowa and a Program Officer at the Ford Foundation, New York. She has authored several books relating to Kolkata: Jewish Portraits; Indian Frames: Women’s Narratives from a Diaspora of Hope; The Man with Many Hats; The Teak Almirah; and co-authored Where Gods Reside: Sacred Places of Kolkata. She is the curator of www.jewishcalcutta.in
